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Inventors

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Pelling in the kitchen with asparagus, the veggie that inspired his work on spinal cord injuries.
science

The Biophysicist Transforming Asparagus Into Medical Implants

A horror movie proved an unlikely source of inspiration.
Cari Shane August 4, 2021
Santa Clara, California

John J. Montgomery Obelisk

Today's aerospace industry can be traced back to one man and his gliders.
Granville T. Woods, pictured in an 1895 issue of <em>The Cosmopolitan</em>.
science

Sold: An 1891 Patent by Granville T. Woods, Innovative Black Engineer

Woods was prolific, but was largely forgotten for many years after his death.
Matthew Taub July 22, 2020
Alfred Nobel's Grave
Stockholm, Sweden

Alfred Nobel's Grave

The final resting place of the man whose name has become synonymous with greatness.
Permanently Closed
San Francisco, California

Benkyodo

This Japanese treats shop may have been the first business to mass-produce fortune cookies in the United States.
Edinburgh, Scotland

Cafe Royal

Come for the oysters, stay for the priceless art honoring inventors across history and Scotland's favorite outdoor sports.
Four men in boater hats enjoy a last drink together before Prohibition begins in 1919.
bars

How Prohibition Tossed a Wet Blanket on America’s Inventors

New research reveals the link between bars and new inventions.
Alex Mayyasi September 4, 2019
Wilson Greatbatch's tool box.
Clarence, New York

Greatbatch Barn

This exhibit pays tribute to the “humble tinkerer” who invented the implantable pacemaker.
Rhönraddenkmal Schönau an der Brend in winter.
Schönau an der Brend, Germany

Rhönrad-Denkmal Schönau (Schönau Gyrowheel Monument)

A memorial to a dizzying sports device and its creator.
Clinton, Tennessee

Asa Jackson’s Perpetual Motion Machine

This improbable contraption was passed down through five generations of industrious Tennesseans.
Ralph Baer Memorial.
Manchester, New Hampshire

Ralph Baer Memorial

This riverfront statue honors the inventor of the first video games ever sold.
Abbasid Caliph al-Ma'mun was a renowned supporter of the sciences.
objects of intrigue

3 Brothers From Baghdad and Their Remarkable 9th-Century Book of Inventions

A prescient relic of the Islamic Golden Age.
Jonny Keen April 2, 2019
Chastleton House across the croquet lawn.
Chastleton, England

Chastleton House Croquet Lawn

Where the rules of that most quintessentially English game were first devised by an eccentric inventor.
Edison concrete houses along Polk Street in Gary, Indiana
Montclair, New Jersey

Thomas Edison's Concrete Houses

Edison's cast-in-place concrete houses were a failure, but way ahead of their time.
An advertisement for customizable cucumber glasses.
objects of intrigue

How England Got Its Curvy Cucumbers Straightened Out

The cucumber straightener was a marvel of British horticulture.
Abbey Perreault August 9, 2018
Vintage bikes such as this 1941 Schwinn were key to the development of mountain biking.
Fairfax, California

Marin Museum of Bicycling and Mountain Bike Hall of Fame

Centuries of biking history are nestled in the shadow of the birthplace of contemporary mountain biking.
A blueprint for the digester, from 1687.
food

The Instant Pot of the 1600s Was Known as 'the Digester of Bones'

The pressure cooker led directly to the invention of the steam engine.
Daniel Crown July 18, 2018
Luther Burbank, at one of his experimental farms in 1901.
food

America's Greatest Horticulturist Left Behind a Plum Mystery

Frida Kahlo painted him. Thomas Edison admired him. Now Rachel Spaeth is trying to decode him.
Anne Ewbank April 30, 2018